Mesa to honor some owners for homes' TLC

by Gary Nelson - Sept. 30, 2010 12:00 AMArizona Business Gazette

Most of the headlines about housing in Mesa for the past few years have been, frankly, dismal.

Even the successful Neighborhood Stabilization Program, which is pouring millions of federal dollars into rehabbing homes in the 85204 ZIP code area, is the offspring of an epic collapse in property values.

Still, an old song says, "You got to accentuate the positive," if such can be found. So Mesa is about to launch a program honoring people who spend time and money making their homes models for the neighborhood.

Code compliance director Tammy Albright told a City Council committee this month the idea came from compliance officer Sam Jeppsen and is backed by other team members.

During their rounds, the officers will look not only for properties in violation of property-maintenance laws, but for those whose architecture or landscaping are a cut above what's normal for the area.

Other city staffers and members of the public can nominate homes by mail, phone, e-mail or by a link to be set up on Mesa's website.

All nominated homes will get certificates, quarterly winners will get a laminated plaque that can be displayed in the yard, and annual winners will be honored by the mayor as part of the "Better Mesa" awards program.

"Sometimes you have a little project like this that is a small acorn that can make a difference in terms of bringing neighbors together," Councilman Dennis Kavanaugh said.

Councilman Dave Richins backed the idea, suggesting it be expanded to include commercial properties.

The lone no vote came from Dina Higgins, who chairs the Community and Neighborhood Services Committee and said it would impose more burdens on city staff.

"You're already 10 officers short," she told Albright. "Now, we're asking them to do even more stuff." She called the laminated yard signs "silly" and said such programs are best left to homeowners associations.

Kavanaugh said, however, that many neighborhoods standing to benefit from the program don't have HOAs. "This can be a community-building project," he said.

Albright briefed the committee on another idea floated by staffers this summer, one that would require lenders to register properties that have been abandoned but not yet foreclosed upon.

The idea was to assign responsibility for maintenance to the banks even before they took back the keys.

But Albright said, "There . . . were some legal concerns about trying to make a bank go onto a property that they don't legally have possession of yet." And, she said, banks are doing a much better job than they were earlier in the recession of caring for properties once foreclosures are final.

Further, an abandoned-property registry would cost $95,000 to set up and operate for the first year, with little to show for it.

So the idea is being dropped. Mesa will expand its use of county probationers to tidy up abandoned properties, which they've already done about 30 times this year. Mesa pays the county $2,400 a year for the service.